Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1887-02-07
PILLARS OF SMOKE.
DIR. TALMAGR breaches A VIVID SERMON
on THE CHURCH.
The Persecution and Suffering the Church Of Tod
has Endured-HaS Persecution Caased?-
What That Persecution is at
the Present Time
specinl 7slearan to the Reqi&er.

Special Telegram to the Register.
BROOKLYN, February 6.-To-day was
moving day in the Brooklyn Tabernacle,
as the annual pew letting has just occurred
and many have changed places. This
church combines the two plans of pew
rental and free church. The rented pews
this year yield an advance on all previous
years, so that the income will be about
S32, ,OOO But about two thousand sittings
are always kept free, so that no one may
complain that he cannot worship here for
that lack of means This morning Pro-
fessor Browne rendered an organ solo,
First Sonata in d minor by Ritter, and the
congregation sang the hymn:
"Our God, our help in ages past,
| our hope for years TO come"
The subject of the sermon was "Pillars OF
Smoke" and the text was taken from
Solomon's Song, Ch. iii, V. G: "WhO is
this that cometh out of the wilderness like
pillars of smoker" DR.. Talmage said:
The
ARCHITECTURE OF THE SMOKE
is wondrous, whether God with his finger
curls it into q cloud, or rounds it into a
dome, or points it in spire, or spreads it
in wing, or, Us in the text, hoists it i'll y
pillar. Watch it winding up from the
country farmhouse i'll the early morning
chat tha YnSfnr1l in1nSirIn have
begun; or see it ascending from the CHM
neyS of the city, telling of the homes fed,
the factories turning out valuable fabric,
the printing-presses preparing book and
newspaper, and all the ten thousand
wheels of work i'll motion. On clear day
this vapOr spoken of mounts with such
buOyancy, and spreads such delicate veil
across the city, and throws such graceful
| lines of circle and semi-circle, and waves,
and tOSses, and sinks, aud scars. and scat
tiers with such atfluence of shape, and color,
and suggeStiyeneSS, that if you have
never noticed it you are like
a man who has all his
life lived in Paris and yet
never seen the Luxembourg, and all his
life in Rome and never seen the Vatican,
and all his life in LOckpOrt and never
seen Niagara. Fourty-iour times the
Bible speaks of the smoke, and it is about
time that somebody breaches sermon
recognizing this strange, weird, elastic,
charming, terrific and fascinating vapOr.
Across the Bible sky floats the smoke of
Sinai, the smoke OF SOdOm, the smoke Of
Al. the smoke of the pit, the smoke of the
volcanic hills when God touches them,
aud, in my text, the glorious church of
God, coming up out of the wilderness like
pillars OF smoke.
In the first place, these pillars of smoke
Indicate
THE SUFFERING
the church of God has endured. What do
| mean by the church? | mean not
building, nor sect, hut those who in all
ayes and all lands, and of all beliefs, love
God and are trying tO do right. For
many centuries the heavens have been
black with the smoke of martyrdOm. If
set side by side, You could Girdle the earth
with the fires of persecution. R0wlaad
Taylor burned at Hadlcgh; latimeT
burned at Oxford; John Rogers burned at
SmithticId; John Hooper burned at GlOu
NtNttl JOllu ilNNN buillNu bt N''iNbsNhNN'
Lawrence Saunders burned at COnVcntry;
Joan of Arc burned ut ROuen. ProteStantS
have sometimes pointed to the Catholics rs
prosecutors, but both Protestant and Cath
Ollie have practiced infamous crucltieS.
The Catholics during the reign of Humeric
were by Protestants put TO the worst tor
lures, stripped of their clothing, hOiStCd
in the air by pulleys with weights suspend
ed from their feet, then let down, and ears
and eyes, nose and tongue were amputated
and red-hOt plates OF iron were put against
the tendcrest part Of their bodies. George
Bancroft, the historian, says of the State OF
MARYLAND: in the land which Catholics
had opened to PrOtestants mass might
not bc said publicly, no Catholic
priest or bishop might utter his faith in 4
voice of persuasion; no Catholic might
teach the young. II wayward child of
a Papist would but become an apoState
the law wrested for him from his parents
share of their property. Such were the
methods adopted TO prevent the growth OF
POpery." Speaking of Ireland, Bancroft,
the historian, says: Such priests as were
permitted TO reside in Ireland were re-
quired to be registered, and were kept like
prisoners at large within prescribed limits.
All Papists exercising ecclesiastical juris-
dictiOn, all monks, friars and regular
priests, and all priests not then actually in
parishes and to he registered, were ban
ishcd from Ireland under pain of trans
pOrtatiOn and, on return, of being hanged,
drawn and quartered.
CATHOLICISM
rs we'll rs ProteStantiSm has had its mar
tyrS. II does seem as if when any one sect
got complete dnminanCy in any land tile
devil of persecution and cruelty took pos
session of that sect. Then see the CathO-
lies after the HuguCnOtS. See the GentileS
after the Jews in Touraine where a great
pit was dug and fire lighted at the bottom
of the pit, and 100 Jewish victims were
consumed. See the Presbyterian Parlia-
ment of England, more tyrannical in their
treatment of opponents than had been the
criminal courts. Persecution against the
Baptists by Pedo-Raptists. Persecution
of the Established Church against the
Methodist Church. Persecution against
the Quakers. Persecution against the
Presbyterians. Under Emperor Diocetian
one hundred aud fOrty-four thousand
Christians were maSsaCred, and seven hun
dred thousand more of them died from
baniShment and exposure. Witness the
sufferings of the WaldenseS the AlbigenseS,
of the HISTORIANS. Witness st. BarthOle-
news massacre. Witness the Duke of
Alva driving out of life eighteen
thousaud Christians Witness HerOd, and
Nero, and Decius, and Hildebrand, and
rorquemada, and Earl OF MonttOrt, and
Lord ClaverhOuse, who when told that lie
must give account for the cruelties said:
Il have no need to account to man, and as
for God will take Him in my own hands. "
A red line runs through the church history
of the nineteen hundred years, line of
blood. Not by the hundreds of thousands
but by the millions must we count those
slain for ChriSt's sake. No wonder John
Milton put the groans of the martyrs to an
immortal tune, writing:
"Avenge. o Lord, thy slaughtered saints, whose
bones
Lie scattered on the Alpine mountains cold
The smoke of martyrs homes aud mar